Europe

U.S. Vice President shunned Chancellor Scholz whilst in Munich on Friday, preferring to meet AfD party leader Alice Weidel, who is widely regarded as far-right.

U.S. Vice President JD Vance met AfD party leader Alice Weidel during a visit to Munich on Friday, nine days before Germany's election - but pointedly failed to meet with Germany's Chancellor Olaf Scholz.

With Donald Trump’s renewed interest in acquiring the Arctic island, the risk of disinformation directed against Greenland has only increased: to find out what Greenlanders really want, journalists have to battle a rising tide of fake news and dubious polls.

The Munich Security Conference, long a symbol of transatlantic unity, has become a stage for European unease as shifting US foreign policy fuels uncertainty. Vice President JD Vance renewed calls for increased European defense spending, while questions persist over Washington’s commitment to Ukraine and the broader future of NA.

Vance’s attack on European democracy in Munich, perversely twisting the language of democracy itself should leave no doubt whatsoever that the aim of this administration is to destroy the EU and its liberal democracies," said Nathalie Tocci, director of Istituto Affari Internazionali think tank.

Responding to Vance's speech, German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius told the conference: "If I understood him correctly he is comparing parts of Europe with authoritarian regimes. This is not acceptable."

Vice President JD Vance warned European allies attending the security conference in Munich, Germany, against “the threat from within,” arguing that European governments are exercising extreme censorship and have failed to adequately get a handle on “out-of-control migration.”

“The threat that I worry the most about vis a vis Europe is not Russia, it's not China, it's not any other external actor,” he said Friday. “What I worry about is the threat from within, the retreat of Europe from some of its most fundamental values, values shared with the United States of America.”

Vance denounced Romania, a NATO ally, for its recent cancellation of presidential election results over evidence of Russian disinformation. “If your democracy can be destroyed with a few hundred thousand dollars of digital advertising from a foreign country, then it wasn’t very strong to begin with,” he said. “I’d ask my European friends to have some perspective.”

He also appeared to voice support for right-wing parties that have been banned from joining governments in Europe, saying, “Democracy rests on the sacred principle that the voice of the people matters. There’s no room for firewalls.”

Vance said of all the pressing challenges facing Europe and the U.S. “there is nothing more pressing than migration.”

He blamed the “series of conscious decisions made by politicians all over the continent and others across the world,” and he highlighted the Thursday attack in Munich where an Afghan national drove a car into a crowd, injuring at least 30 people.

https://www.visualcapitalist.com/mapped-how-europes-population-will-change-by-2100/

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The European Union’s top diplomat slammed U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration for sidelining Ukraine and engaging with Russia’s Vladimir Putin without consulting Kyiv or Europe.

U.S. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth told allies in Brussels on Wednesday that Ukraine’s aspirations to join NATO and reclaim its 1991 borders as part of a peace settlement were “unrealistic.” He also said the U.S. would “no longer tolerate” European NATO members relying on Washington for security.

The remarks, followed by a surprise phone call between Trump and Putin in which the two agreed to enter peace talks, have stunned European officials and raised concerns that Kyiv may be sidelined in discussions about its own future.

“They [the U.S.] say that it’s not going to be NATO membership, but some other security guarantees. Then the questions need to be answered by everybody — what are these security guarantees, really?” said Kaja Kallas, the EU’s foreign policy chief, ahead of a NATO defense ministers’ meeting.

“Being in NATO, where we have these structures, is actually the best security guarantee,” she added.

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“We shouldn’t take anything off the table before negotiations start. It plays into Russia’s hands. And it is exactly what they want,” she said. “Why are we giving them everything they want even before negotiations begin? Appeasement has never worked.”

German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius echoed her concerns, warning against making public concessions ahead of talks.

“In my view, it would have been better to discuss Ukraine’s possible NATO membership or the country’s possible loss of territory only at the negotiating table, not to rule it out beforehand,” Pistorius said in Brussels.

Kallas stressed that any peace deal imposed without the consent of Ukraine and European allies was doomed to fail.

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[This is an opinionated article by Gabrielius Landsbergis, former minister of foreign affairs of Lithuania.]

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Hungary blocks more than half of the EU’s foreign policy decisions. It continues to obstruct the European Peace Facility, a fund designed to support Ukraine’s defense. Whatever is proposed, EU diplomats have learned to brace themselves for a Hungarian veto.

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The principle of unity that underpinned the European project has been twisted and weaponized. In today’s world, this means paralysis in the face of rapidly unfolding geopolitical and technological developments.

History offers a chilling parallel. In the eighteenth century, the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, once a major European power, was crippled by the liberum veto—a system that allowed any single noble to block all parliamentary decisions. This eventually led to legislative paralysis.

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Recently the geopolitical stakes rose even higher. It is not inconceivable that Hungary would, for example, block retaliatory tariffs against the United States, or disagree with increasing common borrowing for defense if the United States begins to withdraw. Also, the need to regularly renew sanctions against Russia gives Hungary, or any other wannabe disruptor, a very effective way to twist the European Commission’s arm.

Thankfully, the EU is not powerless to stop all this. The Treaty on European Union’s includes Article 7 is, a mechanism designed for this very situation—a member state systematically ignoring European values. The process is complex, but it exists.

Under Article 7(1), proceedings can be initiated if there is a "clear risk" of a serious breach of European values. This must be confirmed by a majority vote in the European Parliament. If the risk is confirmed, Article 7(2) allows for the European Council to find the accused member in breach. If that happens, Article 7(3) enables the imposition of sanctions, including the suspension of voting rights.

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"When the European Union proposed modest defense initiatives, Trump’s Department of State and Department of Defense strongly opposed them. Despite Trump’s aversion to NATO, his administration sought to ensure the United States’ primacy in Europe. That continued in the Biden administration. Yet there has been a subtle and quiet shift, with the United States no longer vocally opposing European Union–led initiatives but not actively supporting them either."

The United States has had a complex relationship with European integration, sometimes supporting it while also acting to limit its autonomy. Historically, the U.S. encouraged European integration as a means to stabilize the region and counter Soviet influence during the Cold War. However, this support was often conditional on Europe remaining within a framework of U.S. leadership, particularly through NATO34.

In recent decades, U.S. actions have sometimes frustrated stronger EU integration. For example, the U.S. has opposed EU-led defense initiatives, viewing them as a challenge to NATO's primacy and fearing they might weaken transatlantic ties1. During Donald Trump's presidency, there was significant resistance to the idea of "European strategic autonomy," with U.S. officials opposing even modest EU defense proposals1. While the Biden administration softened this stance, it did not actively support such initiatives either1.

Additionally, American conservatives have expressed concerns that deeper EU integration could undermine Western competitiveness and U.S. influence on global issues8. This ambivalence reflects broader strategic calculations, where the U.S. seeks to balance encouraging European strength with maintaining its own leadership in transatlantic relations.

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Moldova summoned the Russian ambassador, laid on the table in front of him the debris of Russian drones that attacked Moldovan territory. Here is a video (40 sec.) about it.

The Russian diplomat was summoned to the MFA regarding recent violations of Moldova's airspace by several Russian drones, two of which exploded on Moldovan territory. The Ministry presented the Russian ambassador with fragments of the fallen drones as concrete evidence of these violations of airspace.

The Moldovan side issued a strong protest, emphasizing that such incidents seriously threaten national security and the safety of Moldovan citizens. Authorities in Chișinău stated that such actions violate national sovereignty and represent an unfriendly act by the Russian Federation.

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Diplomatic tensions between Moldova and the Russian Federation have intensified after several Russian drones crossed the country’s airspace on the night of February 12-13, during an attack on the port of Reni, Ukraine.

Moldova is not the only country where the Russian Cultural Center has been closed. In March 2022, the government of Slovenia also annulled an agreement with Russia regarding scientific and cultural centers following Russia's invasion of Ukraine. As a result, the Russian Scientific and Cultural Center in Ljubljana was closed, according to culture.si.

In February 2023, the activity of the Russian Center for Culture and Science in Bucharest was also suspended. According to a statement from the Romanian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, "The center had completely deviated from its original goals of fostering cultural ties and had unfortunately become an instrument of propaganda, disinformation, and justification for Russia's war crimes in Ukraine."

In October 2024, Finnish authorities began seizing properties owned by the Russian state after a court in The Hague ordered Moscow to compensate the Ukrainian national gas supplier for assets lost during the annexation of Crimea, according to The Moscow Times.

Additionally, authorities in Azerbaijan closed a Russian cultural center in Baku in early February 2024, amid deteriorating relations with Moscow following accusations that Russian air defense systems shot down an Azerbaijani aircraft, killing 38 people, as reported by AFP.

Other countries where Russian Cultural Centers have been closed include the Czech Republic and Germany.

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The bill formally endorsed by the Armenian government on January 9 was drafted by several pro-Western political and civic groups largely loyal to Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian. They collected last year 60,000 signatures in support of their demands for a referendum on joining the EU.

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“I would like to emphasize that the adoption of the bill in itself does not constitute an application for Armenia's membership in the European Union,” Deputy Foreign Minister Paruyr Hovannisian said during a two-day parliament debate on the issue.

Hovannisian told lawmakers that the bill is only designed to send a “clear message to the European side about moving our partnership to a qualitatively new stage.”

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Russia has warned that the launch of the EU accession process will mark the “beginning of Armenia's withdrawal from the EEU [Eurasian Economic (EEU), a Russian-led trade bloc].” That exit, according to Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexei Overchuk, would push up the cost of Russian natural gas and food imported by Armenia and cause a sharp decline in Armenian exports. Armenian officials have responded by emphasizing that Yerevan has no plans yet to leave the EEU.

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[The link leads to 2 min. video.]

Alexander Borodai is a member of Russian Duma and one of the founding fathers of the "DPR" (Donetsk People Republic) under FSB control.

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• First, he admits that any ceasefire for Russia will only be a temporary freeze in the war, because Putin's main goal will not be achieved - taking control of all of Ukraine and establishing a puppet Russian regime. Any independent Ukraine for Russians is "Western weapon".

• Second, he admits that Russia has been waging war with the help of people like him in Ukraine since 2014, and in 2022 it only continued with a full-scale invasion.

• And most importantly, third, he directly says that the problem is not that Ukraine can be in NATO. The problem for Russians is that they consider all of Ukraine to be their "historical territory" and that Ukrainians "do not exist as a nation at all", and that Ukraine is inhabited by "divided Russians".

DCI Group’s 2024 clients include the American Petroleum Institute, which has a history of undermining the scientific consensus on climate change.

Archived

The intensity and danger of hybrid threats, as well as disinformation, has been increasing in recent years, while Russia and China are considered the main actors of these threats, according to experts and diplomat at the recent "Balkan Disinfo 2025" conference, which is being held in Pristina.

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Finnish diplomat Tapio Pysalo said that these two countries are cooperating to spread disinformation, also using artificial intelligence.

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"The intensity and dangerousness of hybrid threats has been increasing in recent years, especially considering Russia and the People's Republic of China as the main threat actors. Their objective above all is to undermine our partnerships by sowing divisions within the EU and NATO, by hindering NATO enlargement, especially the EU in the Western Balkans, by undermining democratic institutions including the credibility of elections, by undermining public trust and by polarizing our societies, thereby affecting the stability of our society."

"The goal is to sow uncertainty, fear, undermining public trust and weakening the support we give to Ukraine. I believe that all of this can also be applied to disinformation as a general trend, and in disinformation we see that both China and Russia have escalated their operations in Europe and the US. Russia has invested heavily in disinformation," he said.

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Consultant specializing in new challenges to election integrity, Ben Graham, emphasized that in the United Kingdom, where he comes from, there is a strengthening of pro-Russian narratives from networks of the People's Republic of China.

But, he added that the numerous electoral processes that marked the past year have created some positive aspects for combating disinformation more effectively [but he emphasizes also that] we must also look at the psychological aspects of why people believe this disinformation and how they can convince people. I think we need to work more eloquently in the opposition".

"We see a greater strategic alignment with our adversaries, we see an increase or strengthening of pro-Russian narratives from the networks of the People's Republic of China, and it is important that we work together to counter them."

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Researcher and digital intelligence expert, especially on manipulation campaigns and foreign information influence, Benjamin Schultz from the United States, stated that due to executive orders received from the new American presidency, an attack on researchers is taking place.

According to him, the US has become a hyper-polarized society.

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